Witchy Woman
by Aedammair
Summary: Audrey Parker and Nathan Wurnous are about to stumble upon a town history that will challenge everything they know about Haven - and themselves. Despite what they like to tell you, history DOES repeat itself.
1. Prologue

An idea that struck me while I was sanding boards today for a table I'm building. I was listening to Delta Rae's "Bottom of the River" and thinking about the new season of American Horror Story: Coven.

Plus, I was in Salem this time last year. ;-)

Disclaimer: The characters are 100% not mine.

* * *

She was payment for a debt, settlement of an agreement between gentlemen on the island of Barbados. A local man, known for poor decisions at the gambling tables, owed Reverend Samuel Parris a fair sum of money. Instead of paying that sum, he gave Mr. Parris an Indian slave from his stock.

She was barely fifteen at the time and Parris was unmarried. He took the girl with him to the Colonies, to a small village just north of Boston where a newly arrived group of settlers were in need of a man of the cloth.

She brought her name and all she owned with her that new world. She brought a husband and birthed a daughter, Violet, along the way. She cared for the good Reverend and his family, helped raise his two daughters in that new land.

But then the Trouble came. Unwelcome and unexplained, a sickness swept over the village and took hostage once quiet and cheerful girls. Whispers ran like wildfire and blame landed in one single place, on the Indian slave who had come with Reverend Parris to the village.

Her mother had taught her well, though. She pointed a finger at Sarah Good and Sarah Osborne, waited for the Puritans to change their minds, and slipped away into the night with her husband and daughter before Bridget Bishop swung from the end of a noose.

No one knows where she landed and spent the rest of her days. Her name disappeared from the registries in 1694, with her last known entry belonging to a family in a northern fishing village in Maine. From there, she became a ghost.

No matter what became of her, though, we know she kept her name. Her script is perfect and easy to read on the worn and faded pages of the Haven Town Registry.

_Tituba_.


	2. Tituba

He'll never get used to the multi-colored hair, he's decided. Nathan has seen Audrey Parker's face every day for the better part of three years, has dreamed about that face framed in blond hair, and now…

"Stop staring at me like I'm some kind of zoo animal," Audrey says from her desk across their office. She's in profile, her gaze concentrated on the computer screen in front of her.

Nathan starts at the sound of her voice -_ her voice_, not Lexi Dewitt's - and pretends to shuffle paperwork. He taps his stapler a few times for effect. "I'm doin' paperwork, Parker. Your paperwork."

She turns to look at him, a half smile on her face. "You're full of shit, Wurnous." Their gazes lock and he sees the challenge there - _go ahead and laugh, partner - I dare you._

"It's the hair," he says finally, breaking the stare and averting his eyes.

"My hair?" He nods. "What about my hair?" She pulls a long strand out to look at it, sees nothing amiss.

He sighs, leans his head back, and tilts his chair backwards. He stares up at the ceiling. "It's...different."

Audrey snorts in a very Audrey-like way and he hears the wheels of her chair squeak across the hardwood floor as she pushes back from her desk. He closes his eyes, then, and hears her walking towards him. Even her proximity overwhelms him now. She shifts his wire inbox to a different spot on his desk, hears the shuffle of papers as she sits down where they once were. He can smell her perfume - lilacs and salt air - as she leans forward, his dead nerves almost tingling with anticipation.

"Let me get this straight, partner: You're having technical difficulties over here because I'm walking and talking just like myself...but my_ hair_ happens to be a different color? One that you associate with a certain hip slinging bartender who told you she didn't like pancakes?"

He doesn't move, doesn't nod his head in agreement or say a single thing to suggest she's absolutely, one hundred percent correct.

To be honest, he should have expected what happens next. She slaps him.

Electricity. Every hair on his body stands on end, his eyes shoot open, and the precarious balance he achieved between the angle of his chair and the hardwood floor gives way. He lands on that floor and his head makes a sound like a hollow melon.

"Jesus christ, Parker!"

"Snap out of it, Nathan." He looks up at her and there's an angry expression on her face that's masking both a laugh and worry. "Are you okay?"

"Don't know. My face hurts, though." He rubs at his jaw. "Never thought I'd miss_ that_."

"Masochist." She helps him to his feet, her hands lingering on his bare forearm longer than they need to. They stand that way for a few seconds, staring at each other, until a loud knock separates them. They look at the doorway, find Duke and Jennifer staring at them.

"Are we interrupting something?" Duke asks.

Nathan says "no" while, at the same time, Audrey says "yes". The flush that rises on Nathan's face is worth the smirk from Duke.

"What can we do for you, Duke?" Audrey asks with a smile.

"Actually," Jennifer says, stepping into the office, "we're here because of me." Three sets of eyes turn to look at her and she shrinks a little under their collective gaze. Duke must sense it; he reaches out and takes her hand, squeezes it quickly before letting it go. Audrey and Nathan notice it, exchange a quick glance and a knowing smile.

"Duke told me that you're Audrey...that you've been Audrey since the moment you arrived," she says and Audrey nods. "There's something you need to know, now that you're back. The barn," she says and falters. She shakes herself out of it, starts again. "I can hear the barn again."

Audrey stands, her eyes wide. "What do you hear, Jennifer?"

"Voices, sounds. It's all jumbled..." She trails off and Duke takes over.

"She's been hearing one work in particular," he says.

Jennifer squares her shoulders. "Tituba," she says. "They keep saying Tituba."


	3. American Witchcraft

_Thanks for all the reviews and support! It's my first foray into the Haven world after a long hiatus, so I'm easing in to it. There will be short chapters...long chapters...but I know the direction it's taking me. :)_

They traveled north along the coastline, bundled against the improbable cold of the early Beltane season. Not for the first time since their ship had landed in Plymouth Rock did Tituba think how ill prepared Barbados had left them for the cruel weather of the northern colonies.

John was forever protective, walking beside the horse they'd stolen from the Bishop woman the day her neck had snapped while the townsfolk had cheered. He'd refused to ride and had instead lifted Violet from the hard ground and into the warm arms of her mother.

"Where we goin'?" he'd asked.

"Whichever way da spirit take us."

From her mother's breast, Violet watched the world pass by her young eyes.

* * *

The four of them pile into the library and receive a less than warm glare from Ms. Pince, the librarian. They ask for the American history section and she directs them with a gnarled finger and a frown.

"How old is that woman?" Jenny asks when they're (hopefully) out of hearing range.

Nathan and Duke exchange a glance. "She was old when we were kids…" Nathan starts.

"And she looks exactly the same," Duke finishes.

Audrey smiles at Jenny. "You'll eventually get used to the weirdness," she says. "I promise."

Nathan runs a finger along the spines of the books in front of him, looking for something specific. When he finds it, he literally says 'ah-ha', much to Audrey's amusement, and pulls out a ridiculously thick book.

"'American Witchcraft'," Jenny reads. "1680 to 1750."

"You can't grow up in New England and not know a thing or two about the Salem Witch Trials," he says, setting the book on the reading table and opening it to the index. He finds what he's looking for and they watch him flip through pages. "Tituba." He taps the page and Audrey leans forward, pressing against him as she does so. The sensation overwhelms them both.

When none of the four of them step forward to read the passage under Nathan's finger, Jenny pulls the book across the table and turns it right side up. "_An Arawak Indian slave,_" she begins, _"Tituba arrived in the Colonies with her husband John in 1689 as a member of the Reverend Parris household. When the family moved to Salem Village, Tituba was brought along to care for both of the Reverend's daughters. Before their arrival in Salem, Tituba gave birth to a daughter she named Violet._

_"The Reverend Parris' eldest daughter, Betty, began experiencing violent fits shortly after their arrival in Salem Village. Tituba attempted to use the knowledge she'd gained from her life in Barbados to determine the origin of Betty's illness. When Parris uncovered this, he beat Tituba until she confessed to witchcraft._

_"She survived execution by confessing and naming others in the community as witches, including Sarah Goode and Sarah Osborne, local midwives who were known for herbal remedies. Tituba escaped the gallows and disappeared into the cold New England winter with both her husband and young daughter._

_"No further record of her or her family exists beyond the Salem Witch Trials. Her last known registry entry is from 19 April 1692, upon which Salem authorities note her release from the stockade as a result of Bridget Bishop's arrest."_

The four of them are silent. Audrey's the first to break it. "Time to visit the Teague brothers," she says and snatches up the book before any of them can stop her.


	4. Tuwiuok

Vince Teagues has the the decency to flinch when Audrey slams the American Witchcraft book on his desk. The sound brings Dave Teagues from the back, his owlish eyes impossibly wider behind his round glasses.

"Lexi?" he asks.

She shakes her head, brown and gold curls flying. "Try again."

Vince looks up at her from his chair. "I was wondering when you'd drop the act."

Dave stumbles into the bullpen, steadies himself against the edge of his own desk. "Oh my god...Audrey...it's really you…"

She ignores him, taps the book. "I need answers," she says.

Both men lean in and look at the book, read the title to themselves. "What kind of questions brought you to a book on witchcraft?" Vince asks, genuinely confused.

"How far back does our town history go?" Nathan asks, his tone tighter than usual. Both men look up at him, just noticing his presence for the first time.

"Revolutionary War," Dave says.

Vince shakes his head. "Plymouth Rock era, long before Maine was even a state in the Union."

Audrey flips the book open to the passage Jenny read in the library. The chapter heading stands out, bold black against ivory: SALEM VILLAGE 1692. "I want to see the registry from 1692."

Vince, for the first time in the three years she's known him, looks scared...genuinely scared. "Audrey…"

Dave stands straighter, squares his shoulders. "What name are you looking for?"

"Dave!" Vince says, his voice low and harsh.

"No, Vince. Enough." The tone isn't one any of the three people before him have heard. It's strong, authoritative, and brooks no argument. "Now, Audrey: what name?"

"Tituba."

* * *

She handed John the sleeping child and he helped her down off the tired horse. The warm sun made her shoulders burn. Violet's cheeks were pink in the heat.

"Ain't none gonna give us land, Tituba."

"Hush, now," she said and stretched like a cat. They stared up at the imposing stone building across the dirt road. "We didn' come all dis way fer nothin'."

She crossed the road, back straight and head held high. She reached the door and knocked once...twice. It opened and a man as imposing as the structure itself stood before her.

"Aye?"

"We come to claim land," she said.

He opened the door wider, stared past her to the small child wrapped in her father's arms. John stared back, as straight and solid as his wife.

"Be ye slaves?" the man asked.

"Nay. We be freemen."

"How did ye come to the land?"

"Traveled north along da coast."

"From where?"

"Salem Village."

He stared at her a beat longer. Eventually, his weathered face broke into a smile. "There be land beyond the pines, where the natives call the woods Tuwiuok. You can build yer family there."


	5. Questions and Answers

Don't anyone hate me...this is as far as I've gotten the story on paper...so it'll be a bit of a wait for the next chapter.

Thanks for all the reviews and positive reinforcement! You guys rock!

* * *

"She signed the registry," Dave says, laying the huge, dusty tome on his desk with a fair amount of care. "So did her husband, John, and it looks like she signed for their daughter, Violet."

Vince glowers at them from his desk, arms crossed in protest. Every so often he glares at Nathan. He stopped glaring at Audrey when she took her service weapon from its holster at her hip, laid it on the table, and kept her hand on the grip with the muzzle pointed in his direction.

"When did they arrive?" Nathan asks.

Dave opens the book to where his hand keeps place. "May twelfth, 1694. Two years after the trouble in Salem began."

"This is a fool's errand," Vince grumbles.

"The more you complain, the more I know it's not," Audrey says. "You need to work on your tells, Vince."

"Where did the family settle?" Nathan asks.

Dave scans the record, taps the ancient page. "Tuwiuok, if you can believe it."

"Tituba and her husband were slaves, right?" Audrey asks and Dave nods. "So did a family on the bluff take them in?"

Dave shakes his head, eyes focused on the page. "Not according to the registry. They're listed as freemen." He looks up. "The town sold them a plot of land. It says they built a small house...and a barn."

Audrey's frown is severe. "So just how long have you two yahoos known that Tituba - the woman who was apparently responsible for the entire goddamn Salem Witch Trials - was a Havenite?"

"Audrey, I swear to you that we didn't know until today!" Dave says, indignant.

"Bullshit," Nathan says.

"Nathan, you're treading on thin ice," Vince warns. "Thin ice over deep, dark water."

Audrey slams the gun down on the desk and the attention in the room falls on her. "Enough. I have two questions and either one of you or both of you needs to answer them. Each of them."

"Or what?" Vince asks.

"Or I take the safety off this gun and pretend I'm Lexi again."

The two brothers look at Nathan, either for reassurance that Audrey won't shoot them or a sign that he'll step in before that happens. Maybe both. Nathan's hard expression betrays nothing; he shrugs.

"Go ahead, Audrey," Vince says, "as your questions."

"When did the Troubles first show up in Haven?"

Vince leans forward, rests his forearms on the desk with his hands clasped. "Late 1600s, according to the records in The Archives."

Audrey nods. "And when did I show up in Haven for the first time?"

Another exchanged glance between the brothers, a weighty pause. Audrey taps the bun against the table. "Boys…"

"She's come this far, Vince," Dave says. "She's owed the truth. By us. By Haven."

Vince sighs. His whole frame collapses in on itself. When he looks up at Audrey, he looks broken. An old and weary man. It makes her heart hurt, softens the sharp ball of anger in her chest.

But then he speaks and she finds herself furious all over again.

"You arrived in Haven on May twelfth, 1694," Vince says. "You arrived with your mother and father, and you never left...Violet."


	6. The Guard

_Thanks for all the great reviews and comments, guys! I've got this worked out now, so it's going to just be a case of finding the time to write it all down. Keep with it, though! I promise you won't be disappointed. _

* * *

They built a small house and a barn on a particularly high portion of the bluff. They kept to themselves, helped their native neighbors when they could, and mostly forgot about the Troubles they'd left behind in Salem Village.

Until a cold, January morning in 1706, when the broom in the kitchen fell without a hand or breeze to help it. Violet, now seventeen and a woman all her own, turned to her mother. "Company," she said just as the knock came at the door.

Tituba regarded her daughter, tall as she was, with a stern expression. "We been over 'dis," she said, her voice low. "Don't give dem a reason to wonder, don't give dem a reason to question."

Violet's face remained impassive. "Yes, mamma."

"Now, open da door."

Three broad shouldered men with red beards, the color of an autumn maple, stood on the stone just outside the door. They wore heavy black coats and green scarves and they each wore the same expression on their identical faces.

"We are from the Guard," the first man said. "I am Albright Wallace."

Violet stood back from the door and Tituba came into frame. "What dis, da Guard?" she asked. "I been visited be-fore by a group a men like you. I spent six months in a cell while I waited for dem to tell me I weren't a witch." She crossed her arms over her chest. "What makes you so diff'rent?"

"We are the same, Tituba. Men and women who have come north, from the village of Salem, to seek asylum from those who would hunt us." He held his left arm out, pulled back the sleeve of his coat. A symbol, a maze with compass points in the shapes of men, rose from the skin like a blackened brand. "We know of your gifts, Tituba. Of your daughter's. We are here to protect them, and your family."

She betrayed nothing in her face; she looked at the other men with Albright Wallace. "And who are dey?" she asked.

"Brothers," Albright said. "Thaddeus and Samuel." The two men remained silent, but inclined their heads in greeting. "I swear by the goddess, Tituba. We mean you no harm."

She turned to Violet, then. "Well, child?"

Violet, who could see a devil in man's clothes, took a long look at the men at their door. They remained men, and the longer she stared at them the more she saw. Albright was a father, with two small daughters; Thaddeus, a smithy without a family but a growing love of the local midwife; and Samuel, a carpenter, saw a future in Violet, which she watched play out behind his eyes as she caught his gaze. She smiled at him and the stoic man's face returned it, slight but noticeable even behind that auburn beard.

"Invite them in, mamma," she said. "We have much to discuss."

* * *

The first of the Troubles, related to weather, arrived on March 15, 1706. A local woman, distraught over the death of her lover at sea, brought on a hurricane that destroyed the docks and two of the shipyards.

Two weeks later, on March 30, a family awoke to their home covered in locusts - despite the chill outside. Their six year old son had read a passage from the Bible the evening before on the ten plagues of Egypt.

Others in Haven experienced odd disturbances over the course of that spring; animals who could talk and tell stories, water spirits that took human form and walked amongst them, a man who had the ability to literally turn back time. The Guard made sure those who were Troubled remained safe from those who believed in demons and spellwork. As promised, they kept Tituba and her family safe, sheltered from the strangeness of the village below the bluff.

Samuel visited the little farm once a week on the pretense of bringing the family provisions. John and Tituba knew enough of their own beginnings to see the same in Samuel and Violet. While mother and daughter made coffee, John walked Samuel out towards the apple orchard near the big barn.

"Our Violet is...different," John told the younger man.

Samuel nodded, hands shoved deep into his pockets. "Aye, Mr. Freeman. I know." John eyed him with a wary expression, but Samuel shook his head. "Violet has an open heart," he said. "She sees beyond what you and I do."

John smiled. "She's more her mother in that way." He motioned to the brand on Samuel's arm. "Why do you wear that?"

"I have a Trouble, like the men and women in the village." He held out his arm. "I am unable to feel anything."

John's eyebrows rose into his hairline. "Heat, ice, pain, pleasure?" Samuel shook his head. "Nothing?"

"Coffee on, boys!" Tituba called from the cabin.

"Well, nearly nothing," Samuel said, turning to look at the women up the hill.


	7. Child of Water

Sorry for the delay. Life, eh? ;)

Thanks for all the great reviews and positive reinforcement. If you want some music to set the mood, try Delta Rae's "Bottom of the River".

* * *

Every muscle in Audrey's body wants her to be mad. Her fists want her to punch someone in the nose; her trigger finger wants her to shoot out the windows in the Herald's office; her legs want her to run and never look back. Even non-violent Lexi is screaming from the back of Audrey's mind for her to break something...anything.

The thing that keeps her steady, though, is her heart. It understands what the Teagues have done, understands why they've kept so much from her, because ultimately she's done the same to both Nathan and Duke on occasion. For most of the last year, if she's honest with herself.

Those similar motives of wanting to keep her safe and unharmed, the understanding she feels deep within not just Audrey but whoever else she's been, keep her reflexes from doing something she'll regret. She picks the gun up from the desk and holsters it. The tension leaves the room like air from a balloon.

"How long have you known?" she asks.

"Lucy uncovered it," Vince says. "She broke into the archives at the library with Garland and stole everything they had on Tituba and her family."

She exchanges a glance with Nathan - _I really don't change, do I?_ - before looking at Dave. "What else?" she asks.

Dave opens his desk drawer, pulls out a leather-bound book. He hands it to her. "That's the diary Lucy found in the archives. It belonged first to Tituba, then to Violet. They kept a solid record of everything that happened from the moment they met the Guard."

She takes the book from him and as her skin touches the leather, a visible shock, like a small lightning strike, bridges the gap between the book and her fingers. She feels recognition with that spark, like touching something familiar. She drops it and it falls to the ground slowly, light as air. It lands without a sound on the old hardwood of the newspaper's floor. The pages flutter open on their own, quieting as they reach a middle entry.

She looks up at Nathan and he stoops down, picks it up. They all register the same spark as his fingers wrap around the leather, but Nathan doesn't feel the shock.

"May 3, 1719…" She motions for him to read from the passage. When he hesitates, she reaches out and places her hand on his bare forearm. A deep breath, and he begins to read.

_"__Samuel has left with his brothers for Boston. There are children there who can levitate large stones and there is worry of another Salem before the day is through. I worry for __**him**__; there are storm clouds approaching...warning signs of impending doom. Mama and papa have taken to spending nights in the barn, preparation for something they refuse to share."_

"Warning signs?" Vince asks, more to himself than to anyone else in the room.

"Dave, where are the rest of Tituba's things?" Audrey asks.

"In the Herald's archive."

"Get them." She turns to Nathan. "Call Duke and Jennifer - have them meet us at my place." He nods, pulls out his phone. "You two - grab the rest of what Lucy and Garland stole, then come to the Gull."

She spins on her heel, heads out towards the door. Vince's voice gives her pause.

"We're sorry, Audrey," he says. She stops at the swinging gate between the front office and the brothers' desks. She keeps her back to them, but her head turns towards them a fraction of an inch. "There was a better way to handle this."

"Yes," she says, "there was. Remember that...for the next time around."

* * *

August 20, 1719

They yanked her from the bed, strong hands wrapped round her bare arms. She struggled against her captors, but the roundness of her stomach kept her from a full fight. She screamed out for her mother, her father, Samuel - but no one came to her rescue.

They took her from the house and made their way down from the cabin to the beach below where the waves crashed angrily against the rocky shore. Stones cut into her bare feet; she screamed until her throat ached, until she could no longer cry out. The child in her belly, sensing her mother's danger, kicked and twisted.

As they rounded the base of the cliff, Reverend Flagg came into full view - somber black robes silhouetted against the golden moonlight shining beyond. The water behind him raged. Violet focused her eyes on the figure before her. She felt her daughter still within her.

"What say ye, Violet Wallace?" the good Reverend questioned as the men brought her closer, leaving her to stand on her own in the soft sand near the water's edge.

"Nay, Reverend. I've still no desire to join the congregation."

Flagg's face gave little away, though Violet noted the tension in his stern countenance. Tituba had often told her daughter that Flagg's expression was sour enough to pucker a lemon. Violet understood her mother's statement better now, seeing the old man up close.

"You will be cleansed, Violet Wallace, of the sins befallen you by your mother. You are a child of the Devil, born of the fires of Hell."

Violet raised her head high. "Nay, Reverend. I am a child of Tituba, born of the warm waters of the islands and raised in the cold, frozen land you dare to call home."

His eye twitched. "Your only salvation is baptism, a cleansing by the waters of God's great ocean."

The hands released her. They wrapped chains around her wrists. She kept her expression calm, kept her eyes focused on the cruel man standing before her. An outsider who had arrived from Salem with the summer solstice, Reverend Randall Flagg had quickly established a small congregation of those in the village who believed the Troubles were sent by Satan to test their faith. The Guard had been on high alert since his first morning in the pulpit, a rousing sermon on fire and damnation that Violet had purposefully avoided.

Now, standing before the man himself, Violet felt a cool disgust building within her. She felt the weight of the chains wrapped round her wrists, the cool sand beneath her bare feet, the warm breeze as it caressed the back of her neck. She recalled her mother's instruction from years before, began to wiggle her toes into the sand so she could connect herself to the ground beneath her. She drew a circle in her mind, focused her energy on it, and watched as the circle drew itself in the sand without the men noticing.

Tituba had always gathered her power and strength from fire; Violet, on the other hand, was a child of earth. Complimentary by design, it seemed.

Flagg held up a battered, leather-bound bible. Moonlight glinted off gold lettering on the cover. "Witchcraft is punishable by death, Madame Wallace."

"Your forget your place, Reverend," she said, keeping her feet buried, her focus unwavering. The child within her kicked, then, and the water beyond the Reverend swelled. Tituba had guessed early on that the her grandchild would be a daughter of water. It seemed she was correct. "You are neither a resident of Salem, nor of this village. You've come here without invitation, without reason. These people are free of your God, free of the tyranny you practice in His name. You have no power within this Haven."

The Reverend finally let his stoic face slip and she saw the demon residing inside. Horns grew from his head, while his eyes glowed red in the darkness. The men behind her did not share in the vision; their blessed Reverend remained the same in their eyes.

"I will tie you to a cross and I will burn you myself in the name of oh holy God, Violet." He stepped towards her, his voice a whisper only she could hear. "I will tear the child from your belly and feast on it." Another step closer. "I will burn this village to the ground and I will leave nothing behind but bones and ash."

So intent on destroying Violet was Flagg that he crossed the circle her focus had created in the sand. His red eyes met her blue ones for a single moment before the protection spell propelled him backwards with the same force as a hurricane. At the same time, her daughter kicked and the ocean swelled to meet the flying Reverend. In the shadow of the full moon, the water swallowed him like Jonah and the whale.

She smiled, then, and the chains slipped from her wrists, fell to the sand. She turned, her feet still buried, and faced her captors. They glowed with pale fear. Violet's hair rose in tendrils above her head. She held her arms out, palms facing down towards the sand. The rocks and crystals curled up towards her hands as she gathered the earth.

"Were you smarter men, I truly believe you would run," she said. They continued to stare at her and she unleashed the force within the palms of her hands, the sand and rocks pummeling the men that had taken her captive, had threatened herself and her child. She pushed them back against the cliff base and into the granite rocks, squishing them like roaches under a boot heel.

"Violet!"

Tituba's voice broke Violet's focus. The world stilled and the ocean quieted. The men slumped to the ground, dead and battered beyond easy recognition. Violet stared at her mother, Tituba's long skirts swaying in the faint summer breeze.

"Mama?"

Tituba took tentative steps towards her, her face calm. "What you done, child?"

Violet stepped towards her mother, intent on seeking solace in her arms. The goddess had other ideas and as Violet crossed the remainder of the protection spell, her water broke. From within her womb, the daughter of water wrenched an earth-splitting scream from her mother.

"Oh, child," Tituba said, rushing forward, "it begun."


End file.
